Robert De Niro walks out of interview after spat with journalist

Hollywood legend Robert De Niro walked out of a magazine interview after becoming irritated by questions about his acting techniques.

The double Oscar winner sat down for a chat with a journalist from Britain's Radio Times about his new comedy The Intern, but the atmosphere turned frosty when he objected to the writer's line of questioning.

He eventually asked the interviewer, Emma Brockes, to turn off her tape recorder and he then walked out of the room, leaving her to conclude that the Taxi Driver star is "condescending" and "supersensitive".

Recounting the bizarre incident, Brockes writes that De Niro appeared "depressed" and answered her questions "glumly" before she apparently upset him by asking how he resists the temptation to go into "autopilot" on set.

When she then moved to the subject of bankers moving in to his beloved Tribeca district of New York, De Niro called a halt to the interview.

Brockes writes, "He then pops up out of his chair, starts pacing madly and says he's cutting short the interview because of the 'negative inference' of what I just said. 'What, about the bankers?' I am amazed. 'All the way through,' says De Niro. 'All the way through. Negative inference.' 'Er, like where else?' 'The whole way through and I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it, darling."'

When the journalist then tried to defend her behaviour, De Niro - who stars alongside Anne Hathaway in the new comedy - told her he is "a very good reader of character" before adding he was not happy with the question about acting on autopilot.

Brockes continues: "De Niro is sticking his head out of the door, looking for an aide to come by and save him. Walking out alone doesn't seem to be an option ... (I said) 'I have to say, now that you're going on about it, it makes me think you were on autopilot and you're supersensitive about it' ... His jaw is working and he looks wildly around the room as if in search of a window to jump through. 'I'm not doing this, darling,' he says. (I told him) 'I think you're very condescending."'

Brockes tells British newspaper The Independent: "I have sympathy with De Niro because nobody wants to be there for these choreographed junket interviews. I was expecting him to be a little quiet but the combination of hostility and condescension irritated me and I ended up losing my cool.

"I certainly didn't go in looking for an argument but when it happened I did think, 'At least he's finally saying something'."

- WENN